Big Government Cannot Pay Its Bills, Again

Since Barack Obama became president on Jan. 20, 2009, the federal government has not had a budget. It did not have one for the first two years of his presidency, when Democrats controlled both houses of Congress, and it did not have one for 2011, when the Democrats controlled the Senate and the Republicans controlled the House.

The Senate – continuously under Democratic control during the entire Obama presidency – has not voted out and sent on to the House any annual budget since George W. Bush was president. The House sent a budget to the Senate a year ago, but the Senate rejected it and sent nothing back in return.

In the nearly three years that Obama has been in office, the government has been collecting revenue, borrowing cash and spending ravenously on the basis of what the government calls continuing resolutions – known in Washington by the initials “CR.”